The difference between the gerund and the participls
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"They prefer buying organic food " in this phrase " buying " us a verb or a noun ...?
phrases verbs nouns gerunds
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"They prefer buying organic food " in this phrase " buying " us a verb or a noun ...?
phrases verbs nouns gerunds
migrated from english.stackexchange.com Nov 26 at 12:30
This question came from our site for linguists, etymologists, and serious English language enthusiasts.
@Chappo A gerund is only ever a verb. A gerund clause is an NP, though, and thus can be a subject or an object. But it’s still only a verb, accepting adverbs and objects and rejecting adjectives and noun inflections. "Easily buying food" is different from "the easy buying of food": only the former has a gerund buying and thus a verb; the latter has a noun buying that is not a gerund and thus not a verb.
– tchrist
Nov 26 at 6:57
@tchrist while I hedged slightly by saying "like a noun", your full answer has thoroughly informed me - I've added this to my favourites for future reference :-)
– Chappo
Nov 26 at 7:09
1
@tchrist I hope the world still stands upright. A gerund is a noun form, with no riders. "A gerund is only ever a verb" turns everything on its head.
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:01
2
It's a verb. The traditional definition of a gerund is a word derived from a verb base which functions as or like or a noun. But that is non-committal as to whether the word is actually a verb or a noun. In your example, traditional grammar calls "buying" a gerund because functionally it is similar to the noun “food” in “environmentally-friendly food” – the similarity between the verb-form “buying” and the noun “food” being that they both head expressions with the same function, i.e. complement of “prefer”.
– BillJ
Nov 26 at 14:15
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"They prefer buying organic food " in this phrase " buying " us a verb or a noun ...?
phrases verbs nouns gerunds
"They prefer buying organic food " in this phrase " buying " us a verb or a noun ...?
phrases verbs nouns gerunds
phrases verbs nouns gerunds
asked Nov 26 at 5:15
ARAB ARMY
migrated from english.stackexchange.com Nov 26 at 12:30
This question came from our site for linguists, etymologists, and serious English language enthusiasts.
migrated from english.stackexchange.com Nov 26 at 12:30
This question came from our site for linguists, etymologists, and serious English language enthusiasts.
@Chappo A gerund is only ever a verb. A gerund clause is an NP, though, and thus can be a subject or an object. But it’s still only a verb, accepting adverbs and objects and rejecting adjectives and noun inflections. "Easily buying food" is different from "the easy buying of food": only the former has a gerund buying and thus a verb; the latter has a noun buying that is not a gerund and thus not a verb.
– tchrist
Nov 26 at 6:57
@tchrist while I hedged slightly by saying "like a noun", your full answer has thoroughly informed me - I've added this to my favourites for future reference :-)
– Chappo
Nov 26 at 7:09
1
@tchrist I hope the world still stands upright. A gerund is a noun form, with no riders. "A gerund is only ever a verb" turns everything on its head.
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:01
2
It's a verb. The traditional definition of a gerund is a word derived from a verb base which functions as or like or a noun. But that is non-committal as to whether the word is actually a verb or a noun. In your example, traditional grammar calls "buying" a gerund because functionally it is similar to the noun “food” in “environmentally-friendly food” – the similarity between the verb-form “buying” and the noun “food” being that they both head expressions with the same function, i.e. complement of “prefer”.
– BillJ
Nov 26 at 14:15
add a comment |
@Chappo A gerund is only ever a verb. A gerund clause is an NP, though, and thus can be a subject or an object. But it’s still only a verb, accepting adverbs and objects and rejecting adjectives and noun inflections. "Easily buying food" is different from "the easy buying of food": only the former has a gerund buying and thus a verb; the latter has a noun buying that is not a gerund and thus not a verb.
– tchrist
Nov 26 at 6:57
@tchrist while I hedged slightly by saying "like a noun", your full answer has thoroughly informed me - I've added this to my favourites for future reference :-)
– Chappo
Nov 26 at 7:09
1
@tchrist I hope the world still stands upright. A gerund is a noun form, with no riders. "A gerund is only ever a verb" turns everything on its head.
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:01
2
It's a verb. The traditional definition of a gerund is a word derived from a verb base which functions as or like or a noun. But that is non-committal as to whether the word is actually a verb or a noun. In your example, traditional grammar calls "buying" a gerund because functionally it is similar to the noun “food” in “environmentally-friendly food” – the similarity between the verb-form “buying” and the noun “food” being that they both head expressions with the same function, i.e. complement of “prefer”.
– BillJ
Nov 26 at 14:15
@Chappo A gerund is only ever a verb. A gerund clause is an NP, though, and thus can be a subject or an object. But it’s still only a verb, accepting adverbs and objects and rejecting adjectives and noun inflections. "Easily buying food" is different from "the easy buying of food": only the former has a gerund buying and thus a verb; the latter has a noun buying that is not a gerund and thus not a verb.
– tchrist
Nov 26 at 6:57
@Chappo A gerund is only ever a verb. A gerund clause is an NP, though, and thus can be a subject or an object. But it’s still only a verb, accepting adverbs and objects and rejecting adjectives and noun inflections. "Easily buying food" is different from "the easy buying of food": only the former has a gerund buying and thus a verb; the latter has a noun buying that is not a gerund and thus not a verb.
– tchrist
Nov 26 at 6:57
@tchrist while I hedged slightly by saying "like a noun", your full answer has thoroughly informed me - I've added this to my favourites for future reference :-)
– Chappo
Nov 26 at 7:09
@tchrist while I hedged slightly by saying "like a noun", your full answer has thoroughly informed me - I've added this to my favourites for future reference :-)
– Chappo
Nov 26 at 7:09
1
1
@tchrist I hope the world still stands upright. A gerund is a noun form, with no riders. "A gerund is only ever a verb" turns everything on its head.
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:01
@tchrist I hope the world still stands upright. A gerund is a noun form, with no riders. "A gerund is only ever a verb" turns everything on its head.
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:01
2
2
It's a verb. The traditional definition of a gerund is a word derived from a verb base which functions as or like or a noun. But that is non-committal as to whether the word is actually a verb or a noun. In your example, traditional grammar calls "buying" a gerund because functionally it is similar to the noun “food” in “environmentally-friendly food” – the similarity between the verb-form “buying” and the noun “food” being that they both head expressions with the same function, i.e. complement of “prefer”.
– BillJ
Nov 26 at 14:15
It's a verb. The traditional definition of a gerund is a word derived from a verb base which functions as or like or a noun. But that is non-committal as to whether the word is actually a verb or a noun. In your example, traditional grammar calls "buying" a gerund because functionally it is similar to the noun “food” in “environmentally-friendly food” – the similarity between the verb-form “buying” and the noun “food” being that they both head expressions with the same function, i.e. complement of “prefer”.
– BillJ
Nov 26 at 14:15
add a comment |
1 Answer
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Nouns cannot have direct objects; only verbs can.
Buying is a non-finite transitive verb whose direct object is the noun
phrase (NP), organic food, which itself comprises an attributive
adjective followed by its noun.
The subject of your sentence is third-person personal pronoun They, and
the finite verb corresponding to that subject in number is prefer. The
object of the verb prefer is the entire non-finite verb phrase buying
organic food.
Because the syntactic roles of a sentence’s subject and object(s) must be
themselves noun phrases, that means that the subject and object are both
NPs — even though neither is a noun! A pronoun is one type of NP, and
an ‑ing gerund–participle verb clause is another type of NP. They still
aren’t nouns, of course.
Another kind of NP is the infinitive clause, another type of non-finite
verb clause that can take an object. So these two are equivalent:
- They prefer buying organic food.
- They prefer to buy organic food.
In both those sentences, the only noun is food. Other NPs there of course
are, but only that one noun alone.
To understand how English works, or indeed any human language, you need to
go beyond trivial parts of speech that apply to single words only, never to
multiword phrases. You need to look at the grammatical roles that the
various syntactic constituents are playing, and for that you need a more
modern model of language than the baby steps that Διονύσιος ὁ Θρᾷξ
(Dionysius Thrax) gave us with his eight iconic parts of speech lo these
twenty-one hundred years ago.
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
I don't know if this scholarly exposition would benefit an essentially ELL question in any way. MISS?
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:03
add a comment |
1 Answer
1
active
oldest
votes
1 Answer
1
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
up vote
1
down vote
Nouns cannot have direct objects; only verbs can.
Buying is a non-finite transitive verb whose direct object is the noun
phrase (NP), organic food, which itself comprises an attributive
adjective followed by its noun.
The subject of your sentence is third-person personal pronoun They, and
the finite verb corresponding to that subject in number is prefer. The
object of the verb prefer is the entire non-finite verb phrase buying
organic food.
Because the syntactic roles of a sentence’s subject and object(s) must be
themselves noun phrases, that means that the subject and object are both
NPs — even though neither is a noun! A pronoun is one type of NP, and
an ‑ing gerund–participle verb clause is another type of NP. They still
aren’t nouns, of course.
Another kind of NP is the infinitive clause, another type of non-finite
verb clause that can take an object. So these two are equivalent:
- They prefer buying organic food.
- They prefer to buy organic food.
In both those sentences, the only noun is food. Other NPs there of course
are, but only that one noun alone.
To understand how English works, or indeed any human language, you need to
go beyond trivial parts of speech that apply to single words only, never to
multiword phrases. You need to look at the grammatical roles that the
various syntactic constituents are playing, and for that you need a more
modern model of language than the baby steps that Διονύσιος ὁ Θρᾷξ
(Dionysius Thrax) gave us with his eight iconic parts of speech lo these
twenty-one hundred years ago.
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
I don't know if this scholarly exposition would benefit an essentially ELL question in any way. MISS?
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:03
add a comment |
up vote
1
down vote
Nouns cannot have direct objects; only verbs can.
Buying is a non-finite transitive verb whose direct object is the noun
phrase (NP), organic food, which itself comprises an attributive
adjective followed by its noun.
The subject of your sentence is third-person personal pronoun They, and
the finite verb corresponding to that subject in number is prefer. The
object of the verb prefer is the entire non-finite verb phrase buying
organic food.
Because the syntactic roles of a sentence’s subject and object(s) must be
themselves noun phrases, that means that the subject and object are both
NPs — even though neither is a noun! A pronoun is one type of NP, and
an ‑ing gerund–participle verb clause is another type of NP. They still
aren’t nouns, of course.
Another kind of NP is the infinitive clause, another type of non-finite
verb clause that can take an object. So these two are equivalent:
- They prefer buying organic food.
- They prefer to buy organic food.
In both those sentences, the only noun is food. Other NPs there of course
are, but only that one noun alone.
To understand how English works, or indeed any human language, you need to
go beyond trivial parts of speech that apply to single words only, never to
multiword phrases. You need to look at the grammatical roles that the
various syntactic constituents are playing, and for that you need a more
modern model of language than the baby steps that Διονύσιος ὁ Θρᾷξ
(Dionysius Thrax) gave us with his eight iconic parts of speech lo these
twenty-one hundred years ago.
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
I don't know if this scholarly exposition would benefit an essentially ELL question in any way. MISS?
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:03
add a comment |
up vote
1
down vote
up vote
1
down vote
Nouns cannot have direct objects; only verbs can.
Buying is a non-finite transitive verb whose direct object is the noun
phrase (NP), organic food, which itself comprises an attributive
adjective followed by its noun.
The subject of your sentence is third-person personal pronoun They, and
the finite verb corresponding to that subject in number is prefer. The
object of the verb prefer is the entire non-finite verb phrase buying
organic food.
Because the syntactic roles of a sentence’s subject and object(s) must be
themselves noun phrases, that means that the subject and object are both
NPs — even though neither is a noun! A pronoun is one type of NP, and
an ‑ing gerund–participle verb clause is another type of NP. They still
aren’t nouns, of course.
Another kind of NP is the infinitive clause, another type of non-finite
verb clause that can take an object. So these two are equivalent:
- They prefer buying organic food.
- They prefer to buy organic food.
In both those sentences, the only noun is food. Other NPs there of course
are, but only that one noun alone.
To understand how English works, or indeed any human language, you need to
go beyond trivial parts of speech that apply to single words only, never to
multiword phrases. You need to look at the grammatical roles that the
various syntactic constituents are playing, and for that you need a more
modern model of language than the baby steps that Διονύσιος ὁ Θρᾷξ
(Dionysius Thrax) gave us with his eight iconic parts of speech lo these
twenty-one hundred years ago.
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
Nouns cannot have direct objects; only verbs can.
Buying is a non-finite transitive verb whose direct object is the noun
phrase (NP), organic food, which itself comprises an attributive
adjective followed by its noun.
The subject of your sentence is third-person personal pronoun They, and
the finite verb corresponding to that subject in number is prefer. The
object of the verb prefer is the entire non-finite verb phrase buying
organic food.
Because the syntactic roles of a sentence’s subject and object(s) must be
themselves noun phrases, that means that the subject and object are both
NPs — even though neither is a noun! A pronoun is one type of NP, and
an ‑ing gerund–participle verb clause is another type of NP. They still
aren’t nouns, of course.
Another kind of NP is the infinitive clause, another type of non-finite
verb clause that can take an object. So these two are equivalent:
- They prefer buying organic food.
- They prefer to buy organic food.
In both those sentences, the only noun is food. Other NPs there of course
are, but only that one noun alone.
To understand how English works, or indeed any human language, you need to
go beyond trivial parts of speech that apply to single words only, never to
multiword phrases. You need to look at the grammatical roles that the
various syntactic constituents are playing, and for that you need a more
modern model of language than the baby steps that Διονύσιος ὁ Θρᾷξ
(Dionysius Thrax) gave us with his eight iconic parts of speech lo these
twenty-one hundred years ago.
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
answered Nov 26 at 6:55
tchrist
5,87412137
5,87412137
I don't know if this scholarly exposition would benefit an essentially ELL question in any way. MISS?
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:03
add a comment |
I don't know if this scholarly exposition would benefit an essentially ELL question in any way. MISS?
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:03
I don't know if this scholarly exposition would benefit an essentially ELL question in any way. MISS?
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:03
I don't know if this scholarly exposition would benefit an essentially ELL question in any way. MISS?
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:03
add a comment |
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@Chappo A gerund is only ever a verb. A gerund clause is an NP, though, and thus can be a subject or an object. But it’s still only a verb, accepting adverbs and objects and rejecting adjectives and noun inflections. "Easily buying food" is different from "the easy buying of food": only the former has a gerund buying and thus a verb; the latter has a noun buying that is not a gerund and thus not a verb.
– tchrist
Nov 26 at 6:57
@tchrist while I hedged slightly by saying "like a noun", your full answer has thoroughly informed me - I've added this to my favourites for future reference :-)
– Chappo
Nov 26 at 7:09
1
@tchrist I hope the world still stands upright. A gerund is a noun form, with no riders. "A gerund is only ever a verb" turns everything on its head.
– Kris
Nov 26 at 9:01
2
It's a verb. The traditional definition of a gerund is a word derived from a verb base which functions as or like or a noun. But that is non-committal as to whether the word is actually a verb or a noun. In your example, traditional grammar calls "buying" a gerund because functionally it is similar to the noun “food” in “environmentally-friendly food” – the similarity between the verb-form “buying” and the noun “food” being that they both head expressions with the same function, i.e. complement of “prefer”.
– BillJ
Nov 26 at 14:15